There’s no doubt that the doyens of Britpop got plenty of airplay and sold millions of records, but it was ex-Take That stripper Robbie Williams who rendered the genre’s mischievous, sarcastic, glammy, but also aggressive and obstreperous ethic into something smoother, more radio friendly, more accessible to a broader market. In the US, grunge was […]
Jagged Little Pill by Alanis Morissette (1995) Read More »
Britain in 1995. The Mutually Assured Destruction of the Cold War is but a distant memory, the Islamic terrorism of the coming decade a mere twinkle in Osama bin Laden’s eye. Grunge has been vanquished, Kurt Cobain has passed on, but Princess Diana is very much alive. Chris Evans has his own Friday night cartoon
(What’s the Story) Morning Glory? by Oasis (1995) Read More »
“If punk was about getting rid of hippies, then I’m getting rid of grunge”. Suffice to say, a lot of aspiring British musicians, including Damon Albarn, were understandably proud of their small, miserable, rain-swept island’s foundational contribution to rock music, and they were less than pleased about the invasion of flannel-wearing, heroin-addicted American rockers, descending
Parklife by Blur (1994) Read More »
The success of Nevermind and the buzz around Nirvana created ample opportunities for similarly dishevelled and disgruntled guitar acts to reclaim the upper reaches of the charts from the strutting sirens of 80s synth pop. Far from recognising kindred spirits and potential allies, though, the newly anointed King Kurt imperiously impugned their motives, insinuating in
Ten by Pearl Jam (1991) Read More »
From the perspective of guitar bands, Nevermind blew the bolted doors of commercial success off their hinges and, predictably enough, Nirvana’s imitators and aficionados speedily flooded through the newly opened breach and into the charts. Alice in Chains, however, were no Nirvana clones. Yes, it was inevitable that they would be lumped in with the
Dirt by Alice in Chains (1992) Read More »
“Why in the hell do journalists insist on coming up with a second-rate Freudian evaluation of my lyrics?” Well, Kurt, I’m no journalist, but coming up with second-rate Freudian evaluations of rock lyrics is more or less the raison d’etre of my blog, and Nevermind provides ample opportunities for doing precisely this. But first, to
Nevermind by Nirvana (1991) Read More »
Rock went underground in the 1980s. Yes, there was The Joshua Tree and Appetite for Destruction but, broadly speaking, the decade’s abiding tone was set by gazillion selling pop artists with shiny synths, processed beats, and funky dance routines. But beneath the surface, the guitar backlash of the 90s was gathering pace, in the jangly
‘90s Dreampop / Shoegaze: Essential Albums Read More »
The British version of college radio jangle pop gave us the endearingly misanthropic and maudlin Morrissey, whereas the American equivalent introduced the world to Michael Stipe and his limp-wristed, post-hippie, achingly sincere on-stage sub-flower-power mincing. God save the Queen, is all I can say to that, though she’s dead, boys. Nevertheless, at some point I
Out of Time by R.E.M. (1991) Read More »
The 60s marked the buckling of the ancien régime, the inception of an identifiable rock’n’roll youth culture, and the rise of radically new, thrusting, disruptive, basically optimistic acts like the Beatles and the Who. The 70s saw the retreat of this revolutionary and somewhat utopian spirit in the face of widespread disillusionment and decay and,
Achtung Baby by U2 (1991) Read More »
Cards on the table; U2 are one of my favourite bands, certainly in the top five, maybe even number one, on a good day. Almost all of the music that I grew up listening to was fundamentally negative: the blistering venom of the Manic Street Preachers, the icy darkness of Joy Division, the eerie autism
The Joshua Tree by U2 (1987) Read More »